This is Cathia and if you were to meet her, you would say she is just like any other girl you may have met. Well to a degree, yes she is just like any other girl, she looks just like you would expect a young girl of twenty to look. However unlike like most girls Cathia has Asperger’s. So how does that make her any different? Well for Cathia the world doesn’t occur the same as it does for you and me. For Cathia some of the filters that we have that control our thoughts, emotions, feelings and bodily sensations are not there. Therefore most of the times she is not able to put a block on all the stimulus her mind and body is receiving from the world around her. Social situations that most people find enjoyable, Cathia finds overwhelming and chaotic.

Cathia was diagnosed with Asperger’s when she was about nine and from that time she has lived her life like any other young girl would, but for Cathia she knew the world was not quite the same for her as other girls her age. And the older she got the scarier the world became and the less we saw of her youthful free spirit.

Challenges she has had to face in life have been numerous. These include things like learning to live in the world and not use Asperger’s as an excuse. Not knowing how to explain to her friends what she is feeling and thinking and also not seem like a drama queen. Dealing with being a teenager and the emotional roller coaster ride that is, whilst coping with all the added pressure of completing 12 years of education and confronts of teachers, friends and work colleagues not understanding what it is like to feel and experience the world the way someone with Asperger’s does.

Now another new and exciting chapter of life has now begun for Cathia. She is pregnant with her first child and with that she is not only experiencing the unpredictability of her Asperger’s but she is also experiencing the new found world of baby hormones as the ups and downs associated with having a child growing inside her. Being pregnant and having a baby, especially for a first time
mum, can be a turbulent time, let alone feeling that no one understands you. So to support Cathia and her partner Mitch, a Facebook Community group “Operation Baby Drop” has be established to give them the reassurance that they is not alone and that they has the support of family and friends around them. As a community “Operation Baby Drop” is raising funds and organising everything they need move into a place of their own before their baby is born.

Today I am telling only a small part of Cathia’s story, however there are many young women just like her who have their own story, young women who are struggling to live with depression, anxiety or any of the number of other social disorders. We never know to look at someone what his or her story is, however as human beings we can be very quick to judge others and unless we intimately know another human being we cannot profess to know what it is like to be that person. “Operation Baby Drop” is not only the opportunity to assist Cathia and her partner but there is a greater opportunity to provide support for others young girls and couples dealing with pregnancy and a social disorder, anxiety or depression to feel supported and not to feel they have to do it on their own and to know there is somewhere they can get the support they need from the community.

Further to this I invite you to be generous with the people in your life, take the time to get to know them, connect with them, discover them all over again like you were only just meeting them for the very first time. Time is far too short and life is way too precious to live any other way.

This is the very last photo out my Window from Sydney. Today I have packed up my belongings and I am heading home for Melbourne for good.

As much as I have loved living in Sydney I am so looking forward to not having to get on a plane on Monday morning to have to fly back to work. I am also quite glad I am now on holidays for 2 weeks before starting back to work in Melbourne.

Something else I am looking forward to is getting in my car at the end of a work day and driving back home to be with my family. Being away has just helped me appreciate so much more what a wonderful family I have.

Project Photo Me

Today I was invited by my flat mate to go with her and her friends for a picnic. This was a very different picnic than the usual ANZAC Day picnics I have previously been to.

As my flat mate is Indonesian, today’s picnic had an Indonesian theme. We had a steam boat picnic. There was a gas burner in the centre of the picnic table where all the ingredient were place and when the soup was ready we all helped ourselves to the yummy contents of the pot and it was very delicious indeed.

Half way to where we were going I realised I had left my SD card in my computer at home I so was not going to be able to take any pictures. Doh!! Lucky for me one of my flat mates friends had a spare SD card. Very lucky indeed, I was not sure up until that time what to do with myself without being able to take photos. I was feeling a bit lost.

Later that day we went to see the Blow Hole in Kiama. Unfortunately it was not doing much of anything. Possibly because it was low tide or because the wind was blowing in the wrong direction. I said may be it was because the blow hole needed Viagra. Lol.

Then that night we went back to one of the friends places and we had more steam boat. So glad I accepted the invitation to go. I hope I get invited to the next steam boat picnic.

Project Photo Me

Wow, I can’t believe I backed up from yesterday’s swim with a 14km walk today. First time around the cove was easy, the second not so easy. Half way around the second time I didn’t think I could do it. Lol, too late to change my mind.

Problem was the car was on the other side of the cove and unlike my swim yesterday where I could have just stopped at any time, today I had to make it all the way back. Of course I did, or otherwise I would not be here writing.

This photo is of me feeling very weak at the knees and in desperate need for some water. I have a long way to go yet to get to being able to run a 42km marathon. But it is a great start to getting myself fit and healthy.

This photo is also a part of a series called “Project Photo Me” which I have only just started, where I take a photo of myself everyday in different situations. My concern at the moment is that most of the photos will be of me in my work uniform at work, which I thought might be quite boring. I guess time will tell how interesting they all are. So for now I am taking photos on the weekends rather than every day. The idea is to ask other people to take my photo rather than taking selfies and post photos how I look and am, rather than picking and choosing photos I think might make me look my best. Hence I have not made most of the pictures public at the moment only this one. As I become more comfortable with the idea I will begin to make more of them public.

I would be interested to get the thoughts of other people on the idea and whether I am just being overly self-critical of myself and much too worried about what other people think by not posting more of the pictures. It is only new to me and I guess ultimately the thought behind the idea is that this exercise has me get over myself and my fear of what others think. So what do you think?

Today is the last day of my holidays and rather the fly home in the morning and go straight to work from the airport tomorrow, I have decided it would be better after an extended time away from Sydney, for me to go home and touch home base before returning to work. When I was home for Christmas I went flew out on the Monday and as strange as it may sound, all I wanted to do all day was go home (lesson learnt).

I have been gearing myself up for going home and getting my mind back into gear for work. It would be so lovely to be able to go to work tomorrow in Melbourne tomorrow so that I can come home and be with my family. I find I am fine though when I am in Sydney, but it is difficult to be away from my family for so long. It is much easier when I am away because I am more focused toward work and I must say I have switched off from work during the last two weeks and I now have to switch my work brain on again.

I really am over flying. I never thought I would say that, but I suppose it is not like I am not flying to some exotic location for holidays every fortnight. Of course it is not the flight home to Melbourne that is the problem, I always enjoy making my way home. It is the flight home to Sydney that has me dragging my feet. Early Monday morning alarm to catch a flight to be at work on time. I would fly out Sunday night except that it shortens my stay and I want to be with my family for as long as I can.

I am going Shopping this morning for new work shoes as my work shoes had died. There is nothing like leaving things to the last minute. The rest of the family are going to church with Oma and Opa who are over to celebrate our middle daughter’s birthday which is on Tuesday. Unfortunately I will not be here for her birthday so we will have a little celebration for her today where she will open the present I bought for her. I think at the moment she thinks we have forgotten.

Melbourne has put on beautiful weather for my last day, not that I am going to have much opportunity to do a lot today, although I would rather be just relaxing rather than being traipsing around shopping. If I end up going by myself which it looks like I will, I think I will go get myself a coffee at a cafe and sit outside and soak up some sun.

I ended up missing my flight last night. It was due to a culmination of several things that caused this to happen.

I took my time leaving work and didn’t know my actual flight time. I only had an idea of the time. I arrived at the train station and instead of buying a ticket from the machine I waited in line which meant I missed the the couple of trains leaving in the next 3 minutes which would have well and truly had me arrive on time. Then while waiting for my train an announcement came that the train I was waiting for was running 13 minute late. I then had to decide between a train due in 8 minutes and an express train running 11 minutes later. I picked the wrong one. Should have waited for the express and I would have made it.

As it was I was just a several minutes late and check in was closed. Dame Tiger and their closing check in 45 minutes prior to the flight.

So I race to the gate in the hope to get checked in at the gate, even though I had a feeling this would be useless. I caught the check in girls on the way to the gate and asked would they be able to check me in. They said no and that is how I knew I just missed them. They said they had closed check in late too. Dagnabit!! No use arguing with them and accepting their answer I high tailed it back to the sales desk first for Jetstar even though I knew their flights were full, just in case they had a cancellation. Alas to no avail.

I had prechecked on the train who had flights and prices prior to my arrival at the airport. I skipped Virgin Airlines as I knew Qantas had the cheaper flights. Next problem was I was at T2 and I need to be at T3, so I made haste through the carpark to T3.

I was getting home last night no matter the cost. I got booked on a flight that was to leave 10 minutes after my Tiger flight and I still had time before check in closed.

Wow, what a night. I had myself a little adventure. I hope I don’t do that again. I will make sure next time I know my flight time earlier in the day and I leave at an appropriate time from work to get me to the airport on time so as to avoid the same thing happening again.

Most important thing is I got home and today I got to spend the whole day with my family.

So this the first in a new set of pictures in this series “Out my window”. The view is not quite the same but there are a lot of things that I can photograph. It is a bit hard to get the whole view out my window, however it isn’t anything really exciting like a city view. I am sure if there was a really good view the rent would have been higher.

It has been raining quite heavily since last night and it rained up until around mid morning. Now that it has stopped it means that if I want to go for a walk down to the shops I can. Earlier it was a bit too heavy to go for a walk even with an umbrella.

It is still quite cool for summer and for all my worry that I would not be able to handle the summer here, it hasn’t been too bad.

I can hear a lot more road noise here as I am higher up but this also means better TV reception. I won’t hear the planes going over head as I am no longer in the flight path of Sydney airport. I can hear the clock from the town hall going off on the hour, however by me it goes off 3 minutes early every time. I think they need to adjust this, Lol.

Here is to a change and a new outlook. I hope you enjoy the new photos “Out my window” that I shall be posting.

A good friend of mind once said to me “You really don’t know what’s worth living for until you know what’s worth dying for”. If I look back on it, it took me a long while to get what he meant. I lived in the world of trying to find myself, like that would give me a better understanding of where i was headed in life. As I reflected on his words I started to get a clearer understanding of what he was saying and today I believe his words to be so true.

That which is worth dying for gives inspiration and passion. We see it all the time in the world around us. Especially with parent who would do any thing for their kids. Sometimes they would risk anything for them, like a mother risking her own life in labour to bring the life of a child into the world. A parent giving up an organ to save the life of their child. People say that after moments like these they get a new-found lease on life. Why is this I wonder?

In moments like these there is very little time for reflection on life, “Who am I and where am I headed?”. There is only room for action. Sometimes when there appears no way forward a path appears miraculously from nowhere. Persistence and faith that there will be a way, that there will be positive outcome can create the space for something unexplainable to take place.

Trying to find yourself is like trying to find the path when there is no path yet to take as the path has not head been created. You are going to stand still until that moment of inertia has finally passed and you are willing to take a step forward into the unknown and take a risk in life. Take a gamble and bet on yourself. The odds maybe stacked against you and failure may be immanent, however when your life is created, you get to say where it goes, you get to say what it is you want to do. Failure doesn’t make you a loser. Failure is just a set back, a learning opportunity to find out what works and what doesn’t work on the path to success.

Another good friend of mine said “Unless you are making up your life moment by moment, you can only be coming from the past”. What he meant was unless you are creating life in every moment you can only ever have what the past has ever previously delivered. The past is a good thing it teaches us about possible dangers in life, however some dangers are real and some are perceived and more often than not it is the perceived dangers that cause us to hesitate in life. We end up stuck in a rut, doing the same things over and over hoping for a different result or something new to occur, dreaming of one day someday maybe with a fear that something bad might happen to us but not really remembering why. Hence, I try to live by the motto, “If everything I am doing today in giving me what I already have, then it will take me doing something different to what I am already doing to give me a new future”. Therefore a new future requires me to create something new in my life.

I have learned that life isn’t about changing the past, it is about accepting what has gone before and moving on. I have to stop trying to change the world and start creating the one I want to live in (Be the change you want to see in the world). My wife said to me once “You want the million dollars you just don’t want it in dollar coins” and she was right, I had to admit it. What she was saying was I had everything I wanted in life around me, I just didn’t like the way it looked. She was saying I already had the million dollars, I just didn’t want to accept the way it was because that might mean that I might have to accept that everything I was ever striving for, trying to get, was already there and I didn’t like that. If that is true, I have to ask myself the question “Now what?”.

So if I want to live a life worthy of living, a life where I get a say in who I am, I get to say what I do in the world and I get to create where I am going and the difference I want to make, what is it going to take?

First I need to stop trying to find myself like I am lost. And really how do you find yourself? Look out the window one day and suddenly go “oh there you are behind that tree, get over here I need to start living”. Quite a funny thought really. No I have to learn to love what I already have and choose it like I wanted it and asked for it because in a way I did, as my life has been created by the sum result of all my previous actions and inactions.